This application claims benefit of Japanese Application No. 2000-199743 filed in Japan on Jun. 30, 2000, the contents of which are incorporated by this reference.
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an endoscope device comprising an endoscope suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization, an endoscope not suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization, and an external device connected to these endoscopes.
2. Description of the Related Art
Endoscopes and some treatment instruments used in the medical field are inserted into the body. To again use an endoscope or such a treatment instrument already used once for another patient, the endoscope and the treatment instrument must be cleaned and disinfected after inspection and treatment is over so that infection between patients via the endoscope and the treatment instrument is prevented.
Recently, autoclave sterilization is becoming the standard disinfection and sterilization processing of a medical instrument. This is because this sterilization method does not involve a complicated operation, allows using the equipment immediately after sterilization, and requires low running cost.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H5-285103, for example, discloses an autoclave sterilizer for an endoscope which autoclaves the endoscope without affecting the functions of the endoscope.
The environment of the above mentioned autoclave sterilization presents very severe conditions for an endoscope, which is a precision electronic equipment having such an image pick-up device as a CCD. Therefore an endoscope to be autoclaved has resistance to severe conditions by taking various countermeasures, to include high pressure, high temperature and steam countermeasures, compared with an endoscope intended to be used for general disinfection and sterilization.
In other words, if an endoscope which is not suitable for autoclave sterilization is sterilized using a high temperature autoclave sterilizer by mistake, the endoscope may fail immediately or soon thereafter.
If the user has an endoscope device comprising an endoscope suitable for autoclave sterilization, an endoscope not suitable for autoclave sterilization, and an external endoscope device where these endoscopes can be connected, such as a light source device and a video processor, the endoscope not suitable for autoclave sterilization may be autoclaved by mistake during disinfection and sterilization.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an endoscope device where autoclaving an endoscope not suitable for autoclave sterilization by mistake is prevented.
Since the endoscope device according to the present invention comprises an endoscope suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization, an endoscope not suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization, an external endoscope device where these endoscopes are connected, and an identification part which identifies whether the endoscope is suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization, failure due to high temperature autoclaving of the endoscope not suitable for high temperature autoclave sterilization can be prevented.